If long screening lines, privacy invasions and other TSA-inflicted indignities weren’t enough, the agency now faces a funding battle. A decade since the agency was created in response to the Sept. 11 attacks, a debate is raging over the cost of aviation security and who should foot the bill.

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POLITICO 44

Even Rep. John Mica, the Florida Republican who set up the agency, is now pushing to dismantle and privatize what he calls his “little bastard child.”

The TSA is only going to grow. Aviation experts predict increases in domestic air travel as the economy recovers — and that the bigger traffic flow through the nation’s airports will swamp the current “one-size-fits-all” screening unless the TSA receives a bump in its annual budget of about $8 billion.

As the New York Times has reported, the White House’s recent proposal to triple the security fee for fliers — part of its deficit reduction plan — has added urgency to the discussion. The airline lobby blanketed Capitol Hill in recent weeks to tell members of Congress and their staffs why the hike would result in thousands of lost jobs, service cuts and higher fares.

“We have soundly beat them back every year and plan to do that again this year,” said Sharon Pinkerton, vice president of government affairs at the Air Transport Association. “Part of our success is people’s frustrations with the growth of the TSA. This agency needs to get its act together.”

As the Times reported, airline passengers currently fork over a $2.50 security fee for each leg of a trip, up to a maximum of $10 for a round-trip airline ticket. This recovers less than half of the TSA’s aviation security costs, which have rapidly grown over the years. Since the fee has remained unchanged, taxpayers have been forced to make up the difference.

Under the president’s plan, the fee would get bumped up to $5 for a one-way trip, then see increases of 50 cents a year from 2013 to 2017. Ultimately, it would add up to a $15 security charge on a round-trip ticket — an increase that’ll cover 75 percent of the aviation security budget, according to the Office of Management and Budget.

It comes down to a matter of equity. Is aviation security a function of national security, and therefore all taxpayers need to chip in? Or is the traveling public on the hook for this “risky” activity, much like insurance?

“It gets a little into a philosophical discussion,” said Erik Hansen, director of domestic policy for the U.S. Travel Association.

On top of it all, the White House intends to put about $15 billion of the additional security fee revenue collected over a decade toward paying off the national debt — another point of contention for the aviation community, which argues it shouldn’t be the government’s piggy bank. Airlines also oppose the Obama administration’s call for a new $100 per flight fee on commercial carriers and private planes, which would go to the Federal Aviation Administration for air-traffic services, the Times said.

Readers' Comments (5)

The practices of TSA are abusive and expensive. It is ridiculous that airport security has become so invasive that articles are written to help passengers avoid being sexually assaulted. TSA has repeatedly lied about their procedures, the level of the personal invasion and the expense and arrogantly dismissed victim complaints as exaggerations or somehow justified.

Now they claim that they need yet more money to fund this blatant assault on ordinary citizens who simply want to fly somewhere. They just spent $42 million adding privacy that was already in use in Europe two years ago when they could have had it free to begin with.

Incredibly in less than a year they have managed to convince millions of Americans that it acceptable to digitally strip search and fondle the genitals of their children. No one would have believed this last year and yet here we are, quietly allowing a government clerk to grope our children because spineless politicians have been bullied into allowing this atrocity by a power hungry bureaucracy. Now we’re supposed to reward them for this abuse with yet a bigger budget.

There have been 52 TSA screeners arrested this year for serious crimes, including two last month, one for rape and the other for murder. Of these, nine have been for sex crimes involving children. They can’t prevent crime within their own ranks, but we’re supposed to trust this agency with airport security. The only way to improve airport screening is to abolish TSA.

We cannot continue to waste more and more money on a useless agency that after a trillion dollars has yet to stop one terrorist attack. There are too many other issues that desperately need these funds to allow TSA to squander these on their foolish endeavors.

Today another TSA screener was arrested in Maryland for child pornography.

There have been ten TSA screeners arrested this year for sex crimes, nine of which involved children. Overall 54 TSA screeners arrested so far this year for serious crimes with nearly three months left to go. Unfortunately, these are just the ones who have been caught and likely many more have yet to be discovered.

There are too many criminals in TSA and we must demand that these perverse practices be stopped. Who is protecting our children from these deviants? It is time that we and our elected officials demand and end to these perverse policies to protect our children and the traveling public from these predators.

Sadly this is the result when Government sanctions child molestation, sexual assault and strip searches in the guise of airport security.